The Cleveland Indians have announced their latest class for their franchise’s Hall of Fame, which includes a current Baseball Hall of Fame and a future one.

The Class of 2016 consists of Jim Thome, Albert Belle, Frank Robinson and Charlie Jamieson, who will all be officially inducted a ceremony on July 30.

Jim Thome played for the Tribe for thirteen seasons, first coming up in the 1995 season and staying there until he signed with the Philadelphia Phillies for the 2003 season. As an Indian, Thome would make three All Star Games, and won a Silver Slugger. Statistically, Thome accumulated 1,353 Hits, 337 Home Runs with a Slash Line of .287/.414/.566 and a bWAR of 47.9. Thome is a strong candidate for the Baseball Hall of Fame and is eligible for Cooperstown in 2018.

Albert Belle was a powerful slugger for Cleveland in the 1990’s where he was a four time All Star. Belle finished in the top three in American League MVP voting three times and was a Silver Slugger four times as an Indian. Belle would lead the AL in RBIS three times, Home Runs once, as well as winning the Slugging Title in 1995. Overall Albert Belle’s Cleveland numbers saw him tally 1,014 Hits, 242 Home Runs with a .295/.369./.580 Slash Line and a bWAR of 30.1.

Frank Robinson spent his last few years as a player as an Indian, but Robinson made history as the first African-American Manager in MLB history when he took over the helm in 1974, as a Player Manager. He would be the Indians Manager for two and a half years.

Charlie Jamieson was a member of Cleveland’s 1920 World Series Championship team. As an Indian, Jamieson would play fourteen seasons and led the league in Hits in 1923 and finished third MVP voting the following year. As a Cleveland Indian, Jamieson smacked 1,793 Hits with a Slash Line of .316/.388/.406 Slash Line with a bWAR of 21.8.

This new crop of inductees brings the total to 44 members of the Cleveland Indians Hall of Fame.

We here at Notinhalloffame.com would like to congratulate the latest group to this Hall of Fame.

Only a few days ago the Cleveland Indians announced that the controversial “Chief Wahoo” will be stricken from the uniform from the 2019 season on. Jim Thome is making sure that it won’t be making another appearance permanently in Cooperstown.

Thome, who was inducted in his first attempt and will go in as an Indian is requesting that the “C” will adorn his cap. While the final decision on the hat on the plaque lies with Cooperstown there is no reason to think that there should be an issue. There are fourteen Hall of Famers who went in as Indians and only one (Early Wynn) has Chief Wahoo on the hat. The rest have no logo or a varying version of the “C”.

As for why Thome made this decision he had this to say:

"I know my decision would be to wear the 'C' because I think it's the right thing to do, I think I need to have a conversation with the Hall of Fame because of all the history and everything involved. I just think that's the right thing to do."

From our point of view, we applaud the decision of Thome and are again congratulating him on entering the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Athletes are competitive by nature, but 99.9 percent of them paled to the competitive juices of Wes Ferrell. He was known to get violent whenever he lost and take it out on himself and inanimate objects. He may have been animated himself at times, but his teammates have always said they wanted him on their side.

If you look at the Wikipedia article on Albert Belle you will find that the section on his controversies is longer than his accomplishments. He fought with sportswriters, with fans, with other players and his temper was legendary. So was his prowess with a bat.